Trust didn’t come easy in the Cleveland Browns’ locker room in 2021. After a spectacular 2020 season, the next year saw the Kevin Stefanski-Baker Mayfield duo fall apart in the worst way possible. What started with public jibes over playcalling and injury concerns ultimately ended in the quarterback’s departure, a hurt he’s yet to forget or forgive his former head coach for.

“Failed is quite the reach pal,” Mayfield wrote on X, defending his tenure with the Browns. “Still waiting on a text/call from him after I got shipped off like a piece of garbage. Can’t wait to see you twice a year, Coach.”

Notably, the tweet came in response to veteran sportswriter Orlando Ledbetter’s very public criticism of him.

“#Falcons’ Kevin Stefanski had a dumpster fire at quarterback in Cleveland — Baker Mayfield and Deshaun Watson failed, which started a chain reaction to 11 other starters,” the journalist had written. “QB Shedeur Sanders closed out last season with seven starts.”

But dumpster fire or not, one thing’s clear: Baker Mayfield’s “grand welcome” of Stefanski, divisional rival Atlanta Falcons’ new head coach, was in the making for quite a while.

When Stefanski joined the then-Browns quarterback, it was evident very soon that the team was headed toward a resurgence. They finished with 11 regular season wins, their first playoff appearance in 17 seasons, and a playoff win for the first time in 26 years. Mayfield, on the other hand, completed 62.8 percent of his passes for 3,563 yards, 26 touchdowns, and just eight interceptions in 2020. He also ranked tenth in the league in QBR at 72.2, just behind Tom Brady (72.5), while Rodgers (84.4) and Mahomes (82.9) topped the charts that season. However, it all went downhill too fast, too soon.

The signal caller completed 60.8 percent of his passes for 3,010 yards, 17 touchdowns and 13 interceptions. Mayfield’s accuracy and mechanics took a hit, as did his decision-making. Even off the field, it was clear that the quarterback was becoming increasingly irate with his head coach.

What went wrong between Kevin Stefanski and Baker Mayfield?

After Baker Mayfield’s final game for the team in January 2022, where he was sacked nine times against the Pittsburgh Steelers, he was NOT happy. The quarterback criticized getting no help for rookie tackle James Hudson, who was getting overwhelmed by TJ Watt. Then, after a 24-22 win vs the Ravens earlier in December 2021, he also complained how the calls “got too conservative”. Further, as per Cleveland.com, Mayfield thought “Stefanski’s playcalling didn’t always put him in position to succeed or play to his strengths”. At one point, the young player even theorized that perhaps Stefanski was trying to make him look bad intentionally.

Rumors suggested the front office was weighing a potential future with Deshaun Watson, which Mayfield thought was a primary reason for Stefanski’s “hapless” calls to make him look bad. What upset Mayfield even more was finding out on social media that Stefanski, general manager Andrew Berry and and owners Jimmy and Dee Haslam had met Watson in Houston.

“I felt disrespected,” Mayfield later said on the YNK podcast. “I was told one thing, and they completely did another.”

Top Stories

Prayers Pour In as Cowboys Legend Scott Laidlaw Passes Away at 72

Natural Disaster Strikes San Francisco Just Hours After Sam Darnold, Drake Maye & Co. Arrives for Super Bowl LX

Amid Patrick Mahomes’ Injury Struggle, Saints QB Officially Announces Signing For Chiefs

Sean McVay Shares Update on Matthew Stafford’s Retirement After Sending Message to Rams QB

NFL Launches Investigation on Giants Owner Mentioned In Epstein Files Amid Russell Wilson Links

The 30-year-old was the kind of player who’d always kept the Browns first. Despite suffering a torn labrum in his left, non-throwing shoulder in October 2021 in a game against the Texans, he still played 12 of the 15 remaining games that season. Yet, it’s no secret that his production was never the same. Completing 82 percent of his passes that season pre-injury, the quarterback’s completion rate fell to 57.7 percent, second worst in the league, a fact the front office concentrated more on, instead of looking at his dedication.

Back then, Jason Lloyd of The Athletic also painted a messy behind-the-scenes picture between Mayfield and Stefanski. He reported that the situation had turned into “a quarterback who didn’t trust his coach and a coach who didn’t trust his quarterback,” and that was the beginning of the end in Mayfield and Stefanski’s relationship.

Lloyd further reported that many people inside the building viewed Mayfield as childish, immature, and difficult to coach. Once that narrative took hold, things unraveled quickly for the signal-caller. Stefanski pushed for a massive move in Cleveland, trading for QB Deshaun Watson before shipping Mayfield to the Carolina Panthers in 2022. 

Cleveland ended up paying more than $10 million of Mayfield’s salary in 2021 just to trade him. Watson, meanwhile, received a fully guaranteed $230 million contract, which many see as the franchise’s worst decision to date. They had a losing record in 2021 and 2022. 2023 was kind to them after they went 11-6, but the next two seasons turned out to be disastrous. 

Since Mayfield’s trade, Stefanski and the Browns cycled through several QBs. Joe Flacco, Dillon Gabriel, and Shedeur Sanders are just a few names from the recent carousel, and none of them stuck as the starting QB in Cleveland. 

But now, with Kevin Stefanski entering the same NFC South, Mayfield has made one thing clear: Those Falcons-Buccaneers games won’t just be about standings in the next season. It is going to be personal.